They left it too long after Maastrict to leave. The UK and the City are too integrated into the EU. They're leaving too soon in that we are in a lull before whatever the next badly handled crises are that weaken the EU. At which point they could slip away.

If anything Brexit has actually done more positive for the union that any external force.

The migrants at Calais don't want to register in France as they know they'll have to carry ID in the asylum process whereas if they can get to the UK they can disappear into the migrant communities.

And thirdly, parts of post industrial England have horrible demographics and not even migrants are lured there. I know it's hard to fathom but I toured some of the A10 countries just after the fall of the wall and there's cities in north England that are as economically depressed now.

I really felt the morning of the vote result that this was a fall of the wall type event.

_________________Every single frozen corpse in the Death Zone on Everest was once a highly motivated person.

Those who don't study history are doomed to repeat it. Those who do study history are doomed to watch everyone else repeating it.

kinda hard to blame the EU in relation to migration when the problem is that it has no competence in that area.

Well the EU has succeeded in importing cheap labour into the wealthier countries, which is exactly what the globalist paymasters wanted. From a UK perspective, they've been importing them from the (former) colonies since the end of WWII, after Brexit, that probably won't change.

The Brexiteers will go ballistic when they realise this!

_________________"Democracy is like sausage, you want it, but you don't want to know how it is made". [John Godfrey Saxe]Ronald Coase, Nobel Economic Sciences, said in 1991 “If we torture the data long enough, it will confess.”"Give me control of a nation's money and I care not who makes it's laws" — Mayer Amschel Bauer Rothschild"To be precise, my mistake. Humans are underrated": Elon Musk

kinda hard to blame the EU in relation to migration when the problem is that it has no competence in that area.

Well the EU has succeeded in importing cheap labour into the wealthier countries, which is exactly what the globalist paymasters wanted. From a UK perspective, they've been importing them from the (former) colonies since the end of WWII, after Brexit, that probably won't change.

The Brexiteers will go ballistic when they realise this!

Again, that wasn't an EU competence but the non-EU migration policies of member states.

We've been importing abattoir workers from Brazil for nearly two decades if I'm not mistaken.

_________________Every single frozen corpse in the Death Zone on Everest was once a highly motivated person.

Those who don't study history are doomed to repeat it. Those who do study history are doomed to watch everyone else repeating it.

kinda hard to blame the EU in relation to migration when the problem is that it has no competence in that area.

When you use the term EU you mean the central bureaucracy with its institutions and its lingo about "competences". This is the narrowest definition and it's kinda handy. Frequently when something dodgy or shitty gets done you can just say 'oh well that was the national governments. We knew about it, we co-ordinated it, we agreed with it. But it was the national governments.'

This "competence" thing has always had an air of the "mental reservation" that the Catholic Church finds useful in a tight spot. When I use the term EU I mean it's power players not its silos. Merkel is not schizophrenic. There's not two Merkels, one acting for Germany's interests and the other for the EUs.

Even if it's silos had the "competence" to stop Merkel would it a) do nothing because it instinctively agrees with Merkel about such things b) do nothing because Merkel is in charge of the most powerful statec) do nothing because doing nothing is usually the reaction of sclerotic institutions d) all of the above

This "competence" thing has always had an air of the "mental reservation" that the Catholic Church finds useful in a tight spot. When I use the term EU I mean it's power players not its silos. Merkel is not schizophrenic. There's not two Merkels, one acting for Germany's interests and the other for the EUs.

Even if it's silos had the "competence" to stop Merkel would it a) do nothing because it instinctively agrees with Merkel about such things b) do nothing because Merkel is in charge of the most powerful statec) do nothing because doing nothing is usually the reaction of sclerotic institutions d) all of the above

It's rather convenient blaming the EU for something vaguely "Europe" related. Might as well blame it for communism, since that came from somewhere European.If "EU" means "power players within Europe" now, then we can fully forget "escape" as we'll always be under it's influence.As for the suggestion that making a distinction between "EU" and "vaguely related to Europe" is being Jesuitical, I would suggest that not only is failure to do so sloppy and inaccurate, it is also unnecessary when the term "vaguely connected to Europe (or other more precise terms) could be used.As for what the EU would do: last i heard, the Austrians (with their presidency) and Danes are trying to develop and coordinate some structures to limit migration - processing centres in North Africa etc.

Well the EU has succeeded in importing cheap labour into the wealthier countries, which is exactly what the globalist paymasters wanted. From a UK perspective, they've been importing them from the (former) colonies since the end of WWII, after Brexit, that probably won't change.

The Brexiteers will go ballistic when they realise this!

Well, except that the globalist paymasters ensure that the Social Charter did not become UK law and that the trade unions were broken in low paid industries. If only voters in the UK could have done something to prevent EU laws from being opted out of in Westminster...

edit: oops charter, not chapter

_________________"It is impossible to design a system so perfect that no one needs to be good."

This "competence" thing has always had an air of the "mental reservation" that the Catholic Church finds useful in a tight spot. When I use the term EU I mean it's power players not its silos. Merkel is not schizophrenic. There's not two Merkels, one acting for Germany's interests and the other for the EUs.

Even if it's silos had the "competence" to stop Merkel would it a) do nothing because it instinctively agrees with Merkel about such things b) do nothing because Merkel is in charge of the most powerful statec) do nothing because doing nothing is usually the reaction of sclerotic institutions d) all of the above

It's rather convenient blaming the EU for something vaguely "Europe" related. Might as well blame it for communism, since that came from somewhere European.If "EU" means "power players within Europe" now, then we can fully forget "escape" as we'll always be under it's influence.As for the suggestion that making a distinction between "EU" and "vaguely related to Europe" is being Jesuitical, I would suggest that not only is failure to do so sloppy and inaccurate, it is also unnecessary when the term "vaguely connected to Europe (or other more precise terms) could be used.As for what the EU would do: last i heard, the Austrians (with their presidency) and Danes are trying to develop and coordinate some structures to limit migration - processing centres in North Africa etc.

Typical mental reservation stuff. When an EU power player explodes the EU's own protocol and understanding on the handling of migrants to the annoyance of her neighbours, she's just "vaguely European" again.

Maybe the Austrians will get Captain von Trapp and their navy to sort it out. What are we in - year 4 ?

Typical mental reservation stuff. When an EU power player explodes the EU's own protocol and understanding on the handling of migrants to the annoyance of her neighbours, she's just "vaguely European" again.

Maybe the Austrians will get Captain von Trapp and their navy to sort it out. What are we in - year 4 ?

"When I use a word,” Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, “it means just what I choose it to mean—neither more nor less.”

Typical mental reservation stuff. When an EU power player explodes the EU's own protocol and understanding on the handling of migrants to the annoyance of her neighbours, she's just "vaguely European" again.

Maybe the Austrians will get Captain von Trapp and their navy to sort it out. What are we in - year 4 ?

"When I use a word,” Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, “it means just what I choose it to mean—neither more nor less.”

No doubt Humpty would approve here of your personal use and application of the notion of "vaguely European"

Apropos of nothing, not my usual fare but I chanced across some UK MPs talking Brexit on UK talk radio.

Their level of knowledge about the EU and the UK's withdrawal was shockingly facile. Their arguments, such as they were, were repetitions of referendum sound bites from two years ago.

For example, Daniel Kwazynski MP was pushing a variant of the line that EU need us more than we do them so their will be a UK-favourable deal. Some half-truth stats were employed to support this assertion.

What was most surprising to me was that none of the MPs talked about, even in general terms, EU regulation and CJEU oversight which are pre requisite for Single Market access.

It was all airy fairy talk of free trade deals without actually getting into the fact that free trade involves messy trade offs and some free trade deals are mutually exclusive.

As for the Withdrawal Agreement, from what I heard it's often mischaracterised as the final UK-EU settlement and in any case the consensus in Westminster is that it has no chance of winning a vote in the commons anyway.

One other thing I noted, was that in the commentary on the various negative Brexit economic analysis published no one made the connection that the negative economic outlook means May's Brexit Dividend (for the NHS) promised in June cannot possibly exist.

When Vote Leave had "We send the EU £350m a week let's fund our NHS instead" on the side of a bus that seems like a very relevant debating point.

All in, I found the Brexit coverage in the UK media to be dreadfully simplistic and without a fair bit of prior knowledge (or the time to independently fact check) I'd imagine fairly baffling to the average voter.

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-46407249A UK minister has resigned saying a row over involvement in the EU's Galileo satellite-navigation system exposes Theresa May's Brexit deal as "naive".

The UK had wanted to stay part of Galileo after Brexit, but the EU said it would be banned from the extra-secure elements of the programme.

Mrs May confirmed on Friday that the UK was pulling out of the project.

Science minister Sam Gyimah said it was "a clarion call" and that any deal with Brussels would be "EU first".

_________________"Democracy is like sausage, you want it, but you don't want to know how it is made". [John Godfrey Saxe]Ronald Coase, Nobel Economic Sciences, said in 1991 “If we torture the data long enough, it will confess.”"Give me control of a nation's money and I care not who makes it's laws" — Mayer Amschel Bauer Rothschild"To be precise, my mistake. Humans are underrated": Elon Musk

For example, Daniel Kwazynski MP was pushing a variant of the line that EU need us more than we do them so their will be a UK-favourable deal. Some half-truth stats were employed to support this assertion.

Stunning ignorance that is hopelessly out of date with the reality of the situation.

Many people in London believe to this day that the key to Brexit lies in the German capital. If push comes to shove, they firmly believe, the German car industry would call Merkel to reason. It didn't. And the British attempts at splitting up EU member countries came to nothing.

It's amazing to think that to this day that British politicians are still clinging to the hope that Germany will acquiesce to British demands, to kneel before them and kiss their feet to get any sort of deal that will protect Volkswagen. While the British are correct in realising that the EU as it stands is a shrinking part of the global market, what they fail to realise, is that their influence as a global power within that market is shrinking with it.

Apropos of nothing, not my usual fare but I chanced across some UK MPs talking Brexit on UK talk radio.

Their level of knowledge about the EU and the UK's withdrawal was shockingly facile. Their arguments, such as they were, were repetitions of referendum sound bites from two years ago.

For example, Daniel Kwazynski MP was pushing a variant of the line that EU need us more than we do them so their will be a UK-favourable deal. Some half-truth stats were employed to support this assertion.

What was most surprising to me was that none of the MPs talked about, even in general terms, EU regulation and CJEU oversight which are pre requisite for Single Market access.

It was all airy fairy talk of free trade deals without actually getting into the fact that free trade involves messy trade offs and some free trade deals are mutually exclusive.

As for the Withdrawal Agreement, from what I heard it's often mischaracterised as the final UK-EU settlement and in any case the consensus in Westminster is that it has no chance of winning a vote in the commons anyway.

One other thing I noted, was that in the commentary on the various negative Brexit economic analysis published no one made the connection that the negative economic outlook means May's Brexit Dividend (for the NHS) promised in June cannot possibly exist.

When Vote Leave had "We send the EU £350m a week let's fund our NHS instead" on the side of a bus that seems like a very relevant debating point.

All in, I found the Brexit coverage in the UK media to be dreadfully simplistic and without a fair bit of prior knowledge (or the time to independently fact check) I'd imagine fairly baffling to the average voter.

I think its pretty clear at this stage that politicians (especially within western democracies) are basically Public Relations Officers on behalf of whichever sectional interest they are batting on any given day. While they may have a talent for identifying the power in a room or which way the wind is blowing generally with regard to a particular topic they are simply yes men and women whose very function is to submit instinctually to groupthink around issues as they arise (it could be argued that this is both the strength and the weakness of the democratic model).

The real power lies with those who create the narrative which seeps into the broader cultural zeitgeist, to later mainfest as that same groupthink as parrotted by these elected reps...and indeed others with access to the tools of mass media. Expecting such people to actually understand things that require a bit of mental exertion or indeed basic technical knowledge is surely passé at this point. 'Feelings' are actually more important in terms of communication of the message.

Im guessing/assuming that UK civil servants have a far greater knowledge of the processes than their political masters. However, most would no doubt reach immediately for the remote (after experiencing pangs of horror/nausea) if one of them was to somehow appear on their TV screen.

_________________"It is difficult to be certain about anything except what you have seen with your own eyes, and consciously or unconsciously everyone writes as a partisan.” ― George Orwell, Homage to Catalonia